What is the Right OSHA Construction Course for Your Workforce?

OSHA construction safety training provides employers and workers with the training necessary to recognize, avoid, prevent, and abate safety and health hazards in a construction site. If you are interested in this program, you will likely come across 10-hour and 30-hour OSHA safety training courses while exploring the options. Which course is right for you and your team? Here’s what you need to know.                             

A backgrounder on OSHA training

For over four decades, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has made continuous efforts to minimize workplace fatalities and injuries by introducing and updating safety and training standards. Since its founding in 1971, it has helped minimize workplace fatalities by 66% by requiring employers to educate workers on potential hazards they may encounter at work.

Why is construction safety training important?

Understanding OSHA construction safety is essential for all building companies because nearly 20% of annual worker fatalities happen in the construction industry. The fatality rate of private industry construction workers is also three times bigger than other industries, making safety training absolutely critical. According to OSHA, the most common hazards in the construction industry—which constitute almost 80% of all deaths—include falling, getting caught between objects or surfaces, being struck by something, and electrocution.

OSHA has a summary of its workplace safety training requirements, but not everyone has the patience to go through more than 200 pages of material to verify compliance. It’s better to work with an OSHA safety training specialist that can help you understand what courses are best suited to your workforce.

What is a construction worker?

OSHA’s definition of construction work (under 29 CFR 1910, section 1910.12) is any work done for alteration, construction, and repair, including decorating and painting. Workers holding these job titles or are engaged in the following work may be qualified as construction workers under OSHA’s definition:

• Carpentry
• Public and construction engineering
• Plasterwork
• Scaffold, construction, and concrete
• Roof work
• Stonework
• Piping work
• Electrical work
• Block, tile, and brickwork
• Paving work
• Glass Work
• Dredging work
• Steel construction and reinforcement work
• Machinery installation
• Waste facilities work
• Interior finishing
• Water facilities work
• Landscape gardening

Other workers, such as those responsible for the upkeep and maintenance of facilities, fall into the category of general industry workers. That said, depending on the complexity and size, OSHA may consider some maintenance workers as construction workers. Consult an OSHA safety training provider if you need guidance.

Consider signing up for OSHA construction safety training if you employ:

• Carpenters
• Boilermakers
• Dredgers
• Carpet layers
• Linemen
• Electricians
• Fire sprinkler installers
• Fencers
• Elevator mechanics
• Glaziers
• Ironworkers
• Insulation installers
• Laborers
• Masons and stonemasons
• Landscapers
• Millwrights
• Pile drivers
• Painters and decorators
• Pipefitters
• Plumbers
• Plasterers
• Sheet metal workers
• Welders
• Truck drivers and teamsters
• Waterproofers
• Tile Workers

Where can you get OSHA construction safety training?

Impact Safety offers 10- and 30-hour OSHA construction training courses.

Our 10-hour OSHA safety training aims to help workers become more aware of common job-related health and safety hazards. This means focusing on real-world hazard avoidance, prevention, control, and identification. Our course includes elective topics such as excavations, cranes, scaffolds, stairways and ladders, and hand or power tools.

Our 30-hour training course is for workers and supervisors with some safety responsibilities. It emphasizes real-world approaches to hazard avoidance, control, identification, and prevention beyond OSHA’s standards. It includes elective topics such as ergonomics, powered industrial vehicles, fire protection and prevention, and confined space entry.

Check our training calendar or call Impact Safety to learn more. You may also inquire about our OSHA construction safety training programs through our website.